Rep. Maxine Waters Says All US Regulators ‘Better Get Together About Crypto’
California Representative Maxine Waters, ranking member of the United States House Financial Services Committee, has called for coordination and cooperation between government agencies and lawmakers to deal with crypto regulation.
Speaking to Cointelegraph, Representative Waters suggested that recent enforcement actions in the crypto space by the US Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) and the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) may have been to present the image of “doing something substantial and meaningful” after the collapse of major exchanges including FTX. According to Waters, the market crash and related bankruptcies of major firms gave US lawmakers an opportunity to “get accountability” in the crypto space.
“To the CFTC and to the SEC: I’m not going to get in between any disagreement, any dislike, any of the approaches — the two of you should come together so we can deal with crypto,” Waters said. “I think it’s time for the Treasury, the Feds, the CFTC, the SEC, all of us to come together on crypto.”
When Waters chaired the House Financial Services Committee, she supported a bill to regulate stablecoins in cooperation with the Treasury Department, and told Cointelegraph that she “remained optimistic” that such legislation could pass under Chairman Patrick McHenry. She added that bringing regulatory clarity to the room — apparently in an effort to provide additional guidance on enforcement actions — was one of her legislative priorities in the new Congress.
“The world is moving on crypto: different countries, different things we still have to think about,” Waters said. “I think so […] it has to be a priority for us.”
The congresswoman was one of the lawmakers who called on former FTX CEO Sam Bankman-Fried to testify in a December 2022 hearing of the House Financial Services Committee. Authorities arrested Bankman-Fried in the Bahamas before he could appear remotely before Congress.
At the time of publication, the committee had not announced a new hearing on the collapse of FTX or related events in the crypto space. However, Representative Waters said she was “confident” there would be more than one hearing exploring crypto regulation as part of the current congressional session.
“I have many questions that I and members of my committee would like to ask [Bankman-Fried]”, Waters said. “I want to go over the relationship between FTX and Alameda and exactly how much money they have brought into Alameda and what kind of investments were made and what was his relationship with those investments […] Did he know and understand that he was committing fraud?”
Related: FTX hearing: US lawmakers criticize use of Quickbooks, scary dough and ‘conscientious stupidity’
Many in the crypto space have criticized Waters for politically “coddling” Bankman-Fried in a December 2021 hearing, later posing with then FTX boss in a now viral photo. The congresswoman denied rumors that she accepted campaign donations from FTX, saying she had “not received one penny, not one penny” and had nothing to do with contributions from the exchange.
